At £4,000 a night, well worth the wait, Kate Middleton?

PRINCE William and Kate have finally jetted off on their honeymoon to a £4,000-a-night villa in the Seychelles.

The new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge apparently arrived yesterday, 11 days after their wedding in Westminster Abbey. A spokesman for St James’s Palace would not reveal the destination but a source admitted they had set off on Monday. Officials on the Seychelles later confirmed the couple had arrived by private plane at 7.20am local time yesterday. They were then transferred by helicopter to a private island where they are expected to spend 10 days at a secluded villa set amid coconut groves and turquoise seas.

The nightly cost of villas on the islands is typically £4,000. Two Scotland Yard protection officers did a security risk assessment three weeks ago. The Seychelles ministry of tourism would not reveal which of the archipelago’s 115 islands the royal couple had chosen. All a spokeswoman would say is: “We know they want peace and quiet. There couldn’t be a better place for it.”

St James’s Palace said: “The couple have asked that their privacy be respected.” The royal couple surprised many by staying in Britain immediately after their nuptials. William returned to work as an RAF rescue pilot in Anglesey. But the Seychelles has long held a romantic spell over the newlyweds. They stayed there four years ago and a delighted William told islanders it was the best holiday he had ever had.

They spent that week on Desroches, a four-mile long isle about 150 miles south-west of the main island Mahé. The Seychelles is a classic get-away-from-it-all spot in the Indian Ocean where William and Kate can expect barmy temperatures between 75F (24C) and 90F (32C). A possible venue is the ultraexclusive private Frégate island, a 20-minute helicopter ride from Mahé. Just a mile long and less than a mile wide, it is home to rare wildlife and giant tortoises.

One London visitor told the travel website TripAdvisor: “The staff are wonderful and go to huge trouble to arrange beach dining wherever and whenever you want. The hardest part was trying to decide which cocktails we wanted and which beach to have them sent to. It is the closest thing to having your own tropical island.” But a visitor from Monte Carlo was not impressed, writing: “I don’t want to spend two weeks confined to a villa.

“No one at the two restaurants, no one at the bar, no atmosphere… boring.”